Winemaker Notes
Bright and pale in color, with aromas of lemon zest and mint. There's a hint of white pepper on the palate that helps to sustain the persistent finish.
Professional Ratings
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Decanter
Charming, lightly mineral and apple nose. Fresh, sleek and lean thanks to good acidity, it has a polished and stylish character. Forward, but should age quite well.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2015 Chablis 1er Cru Montée de Tonnerre was matured in 50% stainless steel and 50% oak barrels for 15 months. It has an attractive bouquet, with scents of apricot blossom, lemon thyme and struck flint, that is detailed and gains intensity in the glass. The palate is well balanced, with a viscous opening—a smear of honey over citrus fruit-tinged with mango—though it retains decent delineation and poise on the finish. This works much better than the Fourchaume.
One of the most popular and versatile white wine grapes, Chardonnay offers a wide range of flavors and styles depending on where it is grown and how it is made. While it tends to flourish in most environments, Chardonnay from its Burgundian homeland produces some of the most remarkable and longest lived examples. California produces both oaky, buttery styles and leaner, European-inspired wines. Somm Secret—The Burgundian subregion of Chablis, while typically using older oak barrels, produces a bright style similar to the unoaked style. Anyone who doesn't like oaky Chardonnay would likely enjoy Chablis.
The source of the most racy, light and tactile, yet uniquely complex Chardonnay, Chablis, while considered part of Burgundy, actually reaches far past the most northern stretch of the Côte d’Or proper. Its vineyards cover hillsides surrounding the small village of Chablis about 100 miles north of Dijon, making it actually closer to Champagne than to Burgundy. Champagne and Chablis have a unique soil type in common called Kimmeridgian, which isn’t found anywhere else in the world except southern England. A 180 million year-old geologic formation of decomposed clay and limestone, containing tiny fossilized oyster shells, spans from the Dorset village of Kimmeridge in southern England all the way down through Champagne, and to the soils of Chablis. This soil type produces wines full of structure, austerity, minerality, salinity and finesse.
Chablis Grands Crus vineyards are all located at ideal elevations and exposition on the acclaimed Kimmeridgian soil, an ancient clay-limestone soil that lends intensity and finesse to its wines. The vineyards outside of Grands Crus are Premiers Crus, and outlying from those is Petit Chablis. Chablis Grand Cru, as well as most Premier Cru Chablis, can age for many years.